Is Tea Party trying to hid supporters' names?

Armond Turiello concludes his letter on NSA surveillance (July 22) by asking whether the data collected by the NSA will be used to punish political enemies "as the IRS has already admitted doing." I should like to take issue with this statement.

To my knowledge, IRS officials testifying before Congress have never stated that the targeting of Tea Party organizations applying for tax-exempt status was done to punish political enemies. According to their testimony, it was a method used by IRS employees in order to streamline their procedures, so that they could deal more efficiently with the thousands of applications for tax-exempt status which they had received.

I must admit that I was astonished to hear that the Tea Party is a charitable organization. I had always assumed-- based on their political statements and support of political candidates -- that they are a political organization. However, it turns out that there are arcane formulas through which political organizations can get the benefit of tax-exempt status reserved for charitable organizations, if they do a certain amount of charitable work. I can understand why it would make sense that the IRS workload could be handled more efficiently, if similar organizations could be grouped together.

It turns out that some political organizations consider tax-exempt status a great benefit, not only because it saves money, but also because it allows them to keep the names of their contributors secret. It seems that the Tea Party does not want voters to know too much about who supports them!

Lore Prag

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Is Tea Party trying to hid supporters' names?

Armond Turiello concludes his letter on NSA surveillance (July 22) by asking whether the data collected by the NSA will be used to punish political enemies 'as the IRS has already admitted doing.' I

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